Truth is a Four Letter Word
by bouncingcrow
Summary: Another look at the Black Widow's interrogation of Loki on the Helecarrier. One of the world's greatest spies against the God of Mischief himself - how much can we trust what was said? A look at the lies and truths hidden within them. Includes flashbacks, some comic book canon, but mostly movie verse. **Final chapter up.
1. Liar in the service of liars

Disclaimer: I usually don't do these, what with this being _fan fiction_, but for now, here you go – I do not own the characters or the movie plot.

Note: So...there has been this idea in my mind for a while that Natasha was lying to Loki throughout the conversation on the Helecarrier because, well, she was interrogating him. Why would she have been honest about anything? I have been playing with the format, but I don't know that I'm actually settled on it, so...we'll see. Hope you enjoy!

* * *

**Truth is a Four Letter Word**

Chapter 1: A liar in the service of liars

Clint had always been the patient one. Natasha could wait for something, as long as she was busy. She could wait for the information for days if she was playing a part, but standing in one spot, waiting, was outside of her paradigm. Fury was taking too long, trying to convince Thor to walk in and brutally torture his brother to get information. Somewhere between the gentle suggestion and the insistent plea, Natasha had stepped in and reminded Fury who she was and what she did.

Thus, she found herself outside the door to the room where Loki was being held.

She had run through the process in her mind, having spoken to Thor about his brother. He was a trickster; he was smart and cruel, and he needed to feel that he was manipulating her. Easy.

_Black Widow did not interrogate unless she already knew the person she was interrogating. They didn't know her, of course, but she knew if they were more likely to respond to a rough approach or a practiced, gentle hand. Sometimes it took something drastic on her part. This was one of those times._

_Silence was Natasha's second language, and here she was mangling one of the simplest phrases. She slipped out of the room while her host was in the restroom, making sure to tip over something to garner attention. She heard the mutters of the guards, then her host reemerged, a smug smile on his features, "Did you think I was fooled?"_

_Shame burned on her cheeks as one of the guards approached. She didn't want to make it look fake, so she put up a fight, but his obvious prowess was too much, and she found herself manhandled into a pair of cuffs._

"_Take her to the warehouse," her target had muttered in her mother Russian. A black bag was swept over her face, but she already knew where they were taking her._

_Under the bag, she smiled, listening to the familiar back-and-forth of camaraderie between the hired goons, each of them discussing what they would do with the scantily-clad woman. She was preparing herself for the worst, but she felt confident that she was approaching the end of her mission, then she could go home, take a real shower, and maybe even do some reading._

_The vehicle stopped, and she was pulled roughly from the back seat, pushed up a staircase, and then the breeze around her was gone. She was inside the warehouse. Her legs were tied to the chair - "kinky," she had muttered to one of the men behind the black fabric – and her arms were re-cuffed behind the back of the chair. This was going to take a while, she realized._

_When the bag was removed, her eyes adjusted quickly. Two lackeys and her target and hours of fun ahead. For all of the terrible things that happened to her in Russia, all of her reasons to defect, in these moments, she had to be grateful for her Red Room training. _

"_Here is the routine: Yuri here is going to work you over for a little while, give you a preview of what can happen if you do not cooperate with us tonight."_

_The ring leader walked to a shoddy table, unfurling his package of goodies. All of the typical toys were there – tongs, pokers, knives, a needle, even. She would be impressed if she weren't currently working for SHIELD; their little package was bush league compared to her list of goodies now. _

"_I am familiar," she responded with an air of feigned nonchalance, "with how this works. You have probably heard."_

_The man simply chuckled and motioned to one of the meaner-looking brutes, who walked over, making a big show of cracking his knuckles. Natasha couldn't say what happened next because in these moments, she went to one of her happy places. Sometimes it was an early memory with Ivan, sometimes a more recent one – more frequently they'd been recent ones. She found she had a lot to live for these days._

_Her body cued her that the ministrations had stopped, and she gazed at the target with a look of slow resignation._

_Luchkov began his spiel, and she had been filing it away in her mind..._

_She couldn't remember what all had happened after that. It wasn't pain; it hadn't been that they were so good at what they were doing (they were not). All she would remember about that mission for years was the phone call – Coulson on the line, telling her that Clint Barton, perhaps the only other SHIELD agent as dangerous as she was, had been compromised. It could mean any number of horrors, but it was enough to make the petty arms race between Russians seem like a joke._

"_Let me put you on hold."_

Natasha watched him in the cell; he appeared to be deep in thought when she approached. He seemed genuinely startled when he turned to face her, a smile on his features, "Not many people can sneak up on me."

This moment would determine how she went forward, "But you figured I'd come?"

Of course he did. She registered his response, and she had to admit that he was good at this. He was right; Fury's idea had been to send her in after the torture, and her decision to bypass that cliché was probably her saving grace now. She was already a step ahead.

A successful interrogation, Black Widow style, required a complicated dance between truth and lies. Sometimes the truth involved was torture, though in this case, she felt that particular type of truth would only be laughed at. After watching the demigod's interaction with Fury, she felt sure that coming in coy, so that he could tear her down, would get more fruitful results.

_The sound of breaking bones is something that never really goes away from your mind. It's a sound that is unmistakeable, one that it took years to become accustomed to. Natasha didn't even grimace at the sound anymore. Even when the bones were her own._

_They weren't today. _

_The mangled pinky escaped her grasp, and the man to whom it belonged, to his credit, said nothing. Tears brimmed over his eyelids; his teeth bore into his bottom lip, and he shook his head, willing himself not to give away his boss's location. It was almost endearing._

"_Listen," she had purred to him, "I don't like doing it this way. Usually, I sidle up to someone in a cafe," at this she brushed against his side, kneeling down to whisper in his ear, "and somewhere between a crème brûlée and peeling out of my clothes, they always tell me what I want to know."_

_His eyes flicked over to her, and she almost felt bad for letting him know what the alternative could have been. _

_Her fingers brushed some stray hair out of his face, and she continued, "But that's not what I was hired to do this time, _**_Лапочка. I cannot offer you the sweeter side of the Widow today, but I can promise you this," and at this, she maneuvered in front of him, stretching one slim, muscular leg over his lap and settling down across him, "if you can help me today, I can help you later."_**

**_One of her statements was true. It was up to him to decide which was which, but the way she was making up for the earlier, ah, strain on his knuckles, she had a damn good idea on which way he was likely to bet._**

**_When she stepped out of the room, wiping the blood from her hands, she felt that familiar twinge of guilt at giving the man false hope. Clint was outside, his arms crossed in his standard pose to give her space to go through the process._**

**"_Did you get everything," she stopped next to him, looking sideways at him. He nodded._**

**_She walked away, "I'm going to wash my hands."_**

She had played the conversation out in her mind many times, but she felt the stakes were higher than they had ever been, and that put her at a severe disadvantage.

The smile on Loki's face felt faintly familiar. _Oh yes,_ she thought, _he reminds me of me._ This could be very difficult...or very easy. Either way, it was time to determine which truths to tell and which lies to wrap around them. Here it was – the moment of truth.

"I want to know what you've done with Agent Barton."


	2. All is fair in love and lies

**Author's Note: Just a little bit more of my take on things in the Avengers movie between Natasha and the other characters.**

Chapter 2: All is fair in love and lies

The delight on Loki's face was obvious, and its presence in his voice was potent, "Is this _love_, Agent Romanoff?"

The word sounded wrong coming from him. He mocked it, mocked the idea of it. She had the ghost of a feeling that he had been scorned, and apparently women hath no fury like Loki scorned. Coy was the play here.

Natasha crossed her arms, offering a noncommittal shrug, "Love is for children. I owe him a debt."

_One benefit of being fluent in multiple languages was that she understood love on every continent. In her native tongue, love was harsh if you were watching or listening from the outside. But from the inside, it was intense – it warmed the cold nights._

_But her first love had also been arranged._

_Alexei had been the most gorgeous man Natalia had ever met. He was everything a good Russian woman ever dreamed of – he was in the military, a decorated pilot. And he gave Natalia everything she asked for. He had loved her with the passion of youth, and she was consumed by him._

_His proposal was expected, and their wedding was perfect. Natalia had been worried about married life, but Alexei understood her job, her position in life, and he respected that. They built a life together despite the fragile materials they had to work with. Natalia was happy._

_Then he died in the wreck – or so she was told._

_Her heartbreak was so severe that she didn't know what else to do but throw herself into the work that Alexei had never judged her for. She had played right into her handlers' play, and she had been none-the-wiser. Truly, she had learned from the masters of deception and manipulation._

_When Alexei had resurfaced, when Natalia had learned the truth, her first reaction was to go in and take back the life that had been stolen – destroy the men who had done this to her and reunite with her husband. But he had been part of it._

_So she took her revenge in the most effective way she could think to. She defected. _

_And for many years, she had considered that defection even from love. She had burned a lot of poor young hearts along her way to what some might call her redemption. "Love is for children," is what she would say to those foolish enough to fall for her curls, the swish of her hips, and her enigmatic smile._

_It took many years before Natasha, no longer Natalia and all of the baggage that came with her, was ready to open her heart again, but she had. And when she did, she was astonished by how much room was there. _

_She had first learned how to love herself. Confidence was easy, second-nature even, but actually embracing who she was and what she could do, that had taken patience. And help. Then she found herself becoming fond of her fellow agents, making friends even. It was never completely easy; nothing happened over night for her, but she was open to it after many years._

_Once the door was opened, it wasn't long before her capacity for fire and passion flooded out, long bottled up and kept under wraps. She could have tried to keep it that way, making the all-too-common excuse that allowing herself to let someone in again would put them in danger. But the excuse was laughable. Truly, who was more dangerous than she was? The list was astonishingly short, and with her new list of allies, she felt that anyone foolish enough to come after her through someone she cared for must obviously have a death wish._

_It had been the single most rewarding change since defecting, to come full circle to reclaim a little bit of who she was before the horrors of her early days. Followed closely by the increase of travel opportunity; she was fluent in multiple languages, with the ability to understand love on any continent._

Loki didn't quite buy it, she saw. That was fitting. It wasn't entirely a lie, but there was enough of a lie for it to seem a petty test of his skills. Still, he had missed the truth in the statement, and he neglected to mention that she had dodged the question. He wanted her to feel confident.

_Natasha had rarely seen her own blood, certainly not so much of it at one time. It felt sticky on her side, and the pain was excruciating. She thought that her life should be passing before her eyes, but there was already so much death in it, that she felt it a humorless joke. _

_Darkness was creeping in the corners of her vision, and she felt a gurgle starting in her chest. Her own training told her what was happening to her body, how it was failing her. She had tried her comm when the shot had hit her, but it didn't seem to be working. So she had resolved to die here, alone, in a dark warehouse, after a botched job. It wasn't exactly unexpected._

_What was unexpected was Clint Barton's face appearing over hers, his stupid smile forced this time, "You always start the party without me."_

_Despite the pain, she grinned at him, "You're just too slow-" a cough erupted, and she didn't like how wet it was - "never could keep up, Barton."_

_He grimaced at the cough, too, and she could just imagine what came out of her mouth that time. And suddenly she felt a burning desire to make peace with the world. _Shit_, she thought,_ I really am done for._ The thought must have been written on her face because Clint's focused, and he shook his head._

"_No you don't, Tasha. Not today."_

_She shook her head, "Since when...when do you give me orders?"_

_It was getting a lot harder to see, to breathe. The pain was ebbing. She knew. He knew. Why should they fight it?_

"_Since today. The med unit is on their way; I mean they are literally down the street, and you are telling me that you are going to give in? That's not the Natasha I know."_

_Something stirred in her, "How well do you think you know me? What I've done?"_

_He leaned down and whispered to her, then. Her eyes widened, and he pulled away, meeting her gaze. Not another word was spoken then. But she set her jaw, and stared at the ceiling, and he just put his stupid grin on again...although, if she was being honest, it wasn't so stupid now. Even in her thoughts, she didn't repeat what he had said; it was a secret that they both would take to their graves._

_When she awoke in the hospital, Clint was there, reading a local newspaper – well, pretending to, anyway. She knew he didn't read Afrikaans because she didn't. He peeked over the page, sensing her wakefulness, "Welcome back."_

_She grunted in response, pushing herself into a slightly sitting position while the pain was dulled by the drugs, "I guess you win this round, Barton."_

_He just shrugged in response, "You owe me, Romanoff."_

"_I do."_

She could see the inaudible scoff in his shrug, as he turned toward the bench in his cell, gesturing with mock interest and magnanimity, "Tell me," he offered.


	3. The lies we believe

**Author's Note: I seem to be getting some interest for this take on Natasha's talk with Loki, so I am going to keep at it. Basically, I like picking things apart. Thus...**

* * *

"_She could see the inaudible scoff in his shrug, as he turned toward the bench in his cell, gesturing with mock interest and magnanimity, "Tell me," he offered."_

Chapter 3: The lies we believe

The dance was changing again, Natasha felt, the hairs on the back of her neck standing at attention with his strange demeanor. It was unnerving, to see him smiling congenially, while she knew that he was plotting the deaths of so many. Rarely had someone shaken her like this.

All of these thoughts were fleeting, and she covered them by finding her own seat, sitting and spreading her arms in an attempt to show that she was being open, "...I have a specific skill set. I didn't care who I used it for. Or on..."

This was all true. This was the truth of her splayed before him.

_She sat in the back seat of the car, her posture relaxed, as the man next to her listed the number of things that he would like to do her. She smiled and laughed and purred at his words, and he went on about his thoughts without a care in the world._

_Less than an hour later, he was sitting much more stiffly in an uncomfortable metal chair, and Natalia was counting for him._

"_Looks like about a half a liter so far."_

_She gave him a grave, knowing look, "And with your height and build, I'm thinking you could stand to lose about 2 liters. Before you need medical attention. Maybe before you die."_

_He watched her the way an animal watches a predator, as she slid around him, bending over to look him in the eyes. He didn't bother looking at her cleavage now, she noted with some air of amusement; it seemed there were more pressing concerns for him. _

"_Luckily, I have medical training. It's part of what they teach us in our training, but you wouldn't know about that. All you need to know is that I," here she used a pairing knife to indicate herself, "have been sent to find you," she poked the man's cheek with the tip of blade, "to learn where you have hidden the access codes for the Dorofeyev plaza."_

_The man's lips trembled._

_She nodded, "I realize that you are thinking at this point that you are just a security guard, and you are right. But I happen to know that you check on the safe every single night, and I also happen to know," she had started to pace, her heels creating a hypnotic rhythm on the concrete floor, "that there is not money in that safe. That's not what my employers are after, so let's cut to the chase."_

_She eyed the knife in her hand, which she had been tapping on her arm to the tune of her heels, "No pun intended."_

_His mouth opened, "I...I..."_

_She turned to him, then, "Listen. We both know how this is going to end. You can make it easy, or you can make it hard, but I will get the information I need because I always do..."_

_He talked. They always talked, one way or another. Some of them were lucky, when she felt it would be most appropriate to seduce – at least, when she was able to stomach it. Others had taken on the brunt of her unanswered rage and loss. For those, she should have felt sorrow. _

_It would catch up with her one day._

"Agent Barton was sent to kill me. He made a different call."

There are some lies that, if told enough times, become truth. And when working for SHIELD, those lies are the easiest to create. It's simply a matter of dotting the i's and crossing the t's, and then you have a bonafide story that no one can find a hole in. It becomes so accepted that even the people who were there, who knew it was different, would sometimes forget that it was fake.

Except that it didn't happen that way – not on the ground, not in real life.

_Natalia, codename Black Widow, was familiar with the agent who had been dubbed "Hawkeye." Everyone who was anyone in the business of spies and assassins knew about him in the same way that they knew about her. They knew that you didn't cross them, and if you were sent on a competing mission, you simply sat it out._

_No one expected Black Widow and Hawkeye to ever be assigned the same target, much less for one of them to choose on her own accord this one in particular. _

_Natalia was defecting, but she was playing it close the chest. No one knew. _No one. _And part of her plan was to kill the sonofabitch in charge of the Red Room, make it look like an inside job, and then run under the ruse of escaping for her life. Or die trying._

_She wanted out, had wanted out for a long time. She also thought that the Red Room was completely under wraps – no one outside of Russia would know about it. But she was wrong; SHIELD knew about it, and they were displeased. Hawkeye was their answer to this particular type of displeasure._

_It didn't take either one of them long to figure out that someone else was sniffing the same trail, but it took them a bit of time to learn who it was on the other side of the track. And then came the game of cat and mouse – hawk and spider if you wanted to be that kind of obvious – that no one could follow for long without becoming unclear on which was which._

_They came to a head within a mile of Clint's safe house, in an alley littered with newspapers and bottles. She had the upper hand, and with a knife to his throat, she dragged him out into the open, where any watchers could see, and she took him to her own choice of location._

"_You didn't kill me."_

"_Not yet."_

"_Are you going to?"_

"_Depends on your employer. I want immunity. I'm willing to exchange."_

_The man chuckled, and she was slightly annoyed by his blase attitude, "The Black Widow doesn't negotiate or exchange..." he trailed off, looking at her face, long and hard, "or could it be that the infamous Widow is desperate?"_

_With nothing left to lose, she just shrugged, "I am desperate to get out."_

_He had no reason to believe her. Even though every physical sign she was giving would mean honesty in any other person, she was so adept at lying that he knew better than to trust the signs. Still, Clint had always been a little reckless and a sucker for a pretty face, "You know they'll come when I don't check in." _

_Her body stiffened slightly, maybe preparing for a fight, but then her shoulders caved minutely, "I'm counting on it."_

_He pushed further, "They might just kill you. Not give you a chance to negotiate."_

_She hadn't responded. She looked away and said nothing. Her lack of response triggered something in Clint, and he realized how desperate she was, "What did they do to you," he asked softly._

_She found herself unable to speak for a moment. He waited._

"_I just...I don't have...there are only reminders here. I have a debt to repay to society...I took out my anger in the wrong places..."_

_Her thoughts were jumbled with memories of Alexei, the feeling of manipulation. She had no idea that one day this man tied to the chair before her would be the only person who knew the whole story. She could have rambled on, incoherent words strung together into something resembling communication, and he would have listened. But she stopped._

"_How big a debt," was his only response. _

"_I don't know. I won't know until I've paid it."_

"_And you think defecting will help?"_

_She simply nodded, feeling oddly like a child being probed by a parent for information on a broken glass._

"_Okay," he sighed, "then let's make a call."_

Clint Barton had never been sent to kill her. He had been sent to kill what made her. And then he had saved her.

"And what will you do if I spare him?"

It was working, she realized.


	4. A bitter pill to swallow

**Author's Note: Wow. I have been overwhelmed with the success of this story so far, and I have been touched by some of the comments. So thank you everyone who has read and enjoyed!**

"_Clint Barton had never been sent to kill her. He had been sent to kill what made her. And then he had saved her. _

"_And what will you do if I spare him?"_

_It was working, she realized."_

Chapter 4: A bitter pill to swallow

Natasha had to keep this ball rolling; he felt he had gained the upper hand, and so she had to play this one fast, not miss a step.

"Not let you out-"

They both knew that was true with absolute certainty. And that was when Loki launched his initial attack – stating the obvious in a way that made her look like a pleading wretch on the streets of Moscow.

She was admittedly surprised when he started spouting the names, her horror in the face of them only fractionally for show. Her step back was completely involuntary, though she managed to pull herself together despite it all. The red of her moral debt came spilling out of his mouth like knives aimed at the most precise points of her psyche.

_Despite what most people thought about her and what her moniker implied, Natalia's primary training had not necessarily been lethal. There were any number of sins to commit in the world, and many of them were more devastating than murdering a crime lord or someone well past due on their own debts._

_Sao Paolo had proven that fact._

_Regimes fall every day, and when they do, there are others waiting to step in and take over. Kill twenty people, and you are a maniac. Kill two hundred people, and you are a leader. _

_Black Widow's assignment was relatively easy; she was responsible for ensuring the smooth transition between drug lords. Her employer wanted better payment, and that required his friend being the big dog on top. No killing – just the right words at the right times to the right people._

_She had slipped across the border with a passport and a smile, and she had gotten herself noticed in just the right places. After all, sometimes it wasn't who you knew but what you knew, and she knew a whole lot about a whole lot of things. She knew about trades and positions and all sorts of goodies that could be useful to someone who might have ambitions for real power, say, a second in command._

_Gustavo Perez was, if anything, more ruthless than his boss. He had a mean streak a mile wide, and he was cruel. Even then, when she was in her lowest moments, she knew that she should have killed him instead. His cruelties and terrible deeds were longer than hers ever could have been...and she gave him the keys to drive them both to hell. _

_It had been nothing drastic on her part. In her fashion, she had feigned innocence and mentioned offhandedly the money that she had seen passed between a few hands – money that he hadn't know about. She laughed about running into the current boss while out and about, slipping casually into conversation who he was with and where they were meeting. She handed him all of the information he needed to overthrow the man in charge and place himself on the throne of Coca._

_When he took over the cartel, she had fled, not in fear of her own safety but in fear of seeing what she had done._

…

_The hospital fire had been a few years later, in some of the darkest days of her most malevolent years. She hadn't killed anyone in that fire because she hadn't set it. But she blamed herself all the same, and Clint knew that._

_His name was Adriano Trazzi. He was beautiful in the way that Roman gods were said to beautiful, and he and Natalia had thrown their cards on the table and went for it. _

_She had only gone in to intercept some information on a few pieces of extremely valuable art being shipped hither and thither. They met at a fund raising function held by his family; she wore a stunning blue gown, and she had looked up at him through thick lashes, her eyes a mix of everything that a man of his stature wants to see. He was smitten._

_The job did not require that she seduce him. The job was almost done when they brushed against each other on the dance floor, and their eyes met. She needed something to fill the void left by Alexei, and he was a man, and like so many men, he was unable to resist her charms. That night saw passion come alive in a way that has made so many crooners praise Italy._

_Even the best make mistakes sometimes, and hers was in not seeing that this man had a possessive streak. When she disappeared, he was displeased, and he searched for her. But Nadia Rapetti, as he knew her, did not exist._

_He did manage to find her, the _real_ her. She was an elderly woman, well on her way to 90, with a host of medical problems and slight dementia. Her family rarely visited, so the nurses did not expect Adriano to be anything but a long-lost nephew when they let him in. _

_Oxygen is necessary to sustain life, but it is also highly flammable, as many people learned that day. _

_Natasha learned about it through a news story. And then she began drawing up her plans to defect and take the bastards to created her down to hell with her._

The truth was harder than the lies, and Natasha felt her stomach churn at the thought of Clint telling Loki _anything_ about her, about her past.

_Good thing_, she thought, _that Loki is lying about that. All of that information is in my file – at least the official versions._


	5. Truth is a weapon

**Author's Note: Nearing the end here; I believe I have one more chapter's worth after this little bit. This is a short chapter, but I wanted to focus on the one idea. Thank you to those reading and enjoying!**

_The truth was harder than the lies, and Natasha felt her stomach churn at the thought of Clint telling Loki anything about her, about her past. _

_Good thing, she thought, that Loki is lying about that. All of that information is in my file._

Chapter 5: Truth is a weapon

Very few things frightened Natasha anymore, given the number of fears she had faced either in her training or out in the field. Even losing someone close to her, while immensely painful, was something that she could handle – had handled.

Still...

"...not until I make him _kill_ you – slowly, intimately, in every way he knows your fear. And when he wakes, he will have just enough time to see the work he's done, and when he _screams_, I'll break his skull!"

_It had been days inside the cramped space; her eyes had become accustomed to the dark, and her stomach no longer hurt, but that thought did little to comfort her. Her arms and legs had tingled for a while, but she couldn't feel them now, either._

_Running through the medical explanations for these supposed blessings seemed oddly calming._

_Her body was shutting down. It was eating her from the inside out to stave off starvation, and her arms and legs were not pumping as much blood, probably producing sores underneath her weight as she thought about it. _

_At first, she had sung songs and practiced other languages to keep her mind sharp. Then she had recited poems and plays. After that it was reciting the drills of her training. Until finally, she stopped speaking._

_Most of the time, she kept her eyes closed, willing herself to sleep when she could; waking was the worst part, though. Each time she did, she found herself still in the box, and her anguish would become palpable. She would forget about the situation in her dreams only to awaken to the horror all over again, and her body, none-the-wiser, would react the same – fight or flight, a desperate attempt to escape._

_When she thought it could get no more unbearable, she stopped trying to escape. The horror of her first startle from sleep without the body's natural reaction had driven her to force herself to try pushing the lid open one more time._

_She had no idea how long she had been in there. She didn't care to think about it. She did bitterly run over what had happened in her mind again and again – what she did wrong, how the infamous Black Widow was trapped inside a coffin and put 6 feet under. The shame was almost as bad as the sheer terrifying truth of how she would die._

_Her bitter mind tried to blame Clint for their being found out, but it wasn't his fault. Someone must have ratted on them, which meant that someone within SHIELD was to blame. Which also meant that Clint was likely in danger. She wondered idly how long it had been...likely a few days by now; she would die of dehydration soon. She wondered if Clint had made it out of that building where they had tagged her before she could put two and two together. She had a nightmare that he was trapped, too, maybe even inches away._

_..._

_The light hit her closed eyelids, and even then it burned. The fingers on her skin hurt; she could now feel the sores on the bottoms of her arms and legs, and her stomach lurched with each movement that was forced on her. Water trickled onto her cracked lips, and she felt the sharp sting of a needle in her arm._

_Someone had found her – saved her from that hell._

_When she woke, Clint was there, his eyes looking sunken from lack of sleep, but a slow smile on his lips. In that moment, no man had ever looked as good to her – not even Aliano. _

"_Hey," she croaked. It wasn't her voice. She swallowed the fear that there was irreparable damage there._

"_Hey yourself. Thought you could get out that easy did you?"_

_She smiled, but it was haunted, and she knew it by the look he gave her. She had just faced her absolute most terrible nightmare that she had never considered. Silence stretched between them._

_He broke it, "you okay?"_

_She looked at her hands, breathed with relief that she could feel all of her appendages and nodded._

_His hand reached out and pressed against hers, his palm warm and rough against the back of her hand. She sighed and leaned back into the pillows more comfortably, relishing the space in the room._

_He spoke again, his eyes dark, his jaw set, "I got them. Every single one of them."_

_She nodded at that; she had expected as much._

"_When we found you..."_

_Natasha turned at that, "I really don't want to know, Clint."_

_He choked on his next words and looked away, squeezing his eyes shut and shaking his head. For a moment she thought he was going to say more, but instead he clenched his other hand into a fist and coughed again, letting the thought pass him by._

"_Let's just agree that we won't be repeating this little clusterfuck, yes?" she tried to ease the tension._

_He looked up at her then, smiling to hear her banter, and nodded, "Sounds like a plan."_

A shudder took her, and she turned away from Loki.

"You're a _monster_," she whispered, and they both knew there was no lie in what she said then.


	6. True lies

**Author's Note: I've been blown away by the readership of this little story. Thank you for the support, and I hope you've enjoyed. I'm surprised I managed to finish this today, but luckily half time found me ready to write!**

"_A shudder took her, and she turned away from Loki._

"_You're a monster," she whispered, and they both knew there was no lie in what she said then."_

Chapter 6: True lies

Natasha had enjoyed many successes in her history of interrogation, but none felt so monumental as the moment when she heard, rather than saw, Loki's smile, as he scoffed, "Oh, no. You already brought the monster."

And there it was, the big piece to complete the puzzle.

_She grabbed the man's hand and ran, leading him away from the gunfire, ducking away from bits of plaster that flew out of the wall at the bullets' impact. He was not trained, like she was; he was portly, too, but through his wheezing efforts, she was impressed at his ability to keep up so far._

_Stealing a look behind them, she shouted over the racket caused by the gunfire, "We need to grab those files before they catch up to us! Tell me where they are!"_

_Between deep gulps of air, he managed to answer her, "They're...in my...office. Downstairs."_

_She nodded and pulled him ahead of her forcefully, dropping back and waving him on, leaning against the wall with her gun loaded and at the ready. At her motioning, he ran toward the stairs, she ducked around the corner, checking for explosions or pursuers. She fired a few rounds down the hallway they had just vacated, then whipped back around to follow the scientist._

_The man was slowing considerably, and it was becoming more difficult to keep him moving, "Come on," she breathed between gritted teeth, "it's move or die right now."_

_He nodded dumbly, as he fumbled with the door to exit the stairwell, "We're almost there."_

_As if in answer, bullets rained down from above, the sounds of ricochets echoing in the desolate corridor._

"_MOVE!"_

_She pushed him aside, fired off a couple of rounds above them and shoved the door open, forcibly pushing him through and securing the door behind them, "Get to your office! Now! I'm right behind!"_

_The man nodded and stumbled to the right, searching the jingling key ring on his belt loop desperately. Natasha peered through the window of the door, holding her breath for a moment to avoid leaving any trace on the glass. She spotted movement one floor above and leaned away, muttering into her ear piece, "We've made it to the 5th floor, still being pursued."_

"_Copy." _

_She pushed away from the door, staying low to avoid being seen, and followed the scientist, "Find it?"_

_He nodded to her, as he unlocked the door, leaving it open for her to follow. She slipped in and watched him rifle through a tall file cabinet. He pulled out a stack of thick manila folders and read them to himself, mumbling as he did._

_She risked a glance over her shoulder, then turned back, "You got them?"_

"_Yes. These are all of them," he responded, handing the stack out to her for verification._

_The folders were worn, older than most of the files and technology here. On a yellowing and peeling sticker, the labels were still clear, and she had no difficulty reading her native Russian: Red Room Initiative, Black Widow Program, Natalia Romanova._

"_And you say you've found her?"_

_She straightened, her breathing now even, her eyes focused and calm, "You could say that."_

_He hadn't caught on to the shift in her demeanor yet, instead busying himself with gathering other materials and personal effects, "Good. She's been missing for a long time. Are we okay on time? Are they in the hallway?" _

_When he looked up to peer out the window and hear her answer, he saw only the barrel of her gun and a cold gaze meeting his, "Yes, she has. And you wouldn't give up, even when she had succeeded in starting over. And yes, they are in the hallway."_

_At that, she stepped aside and turned the knob. Three agents walked in calmly – two with guns, and one, the man found surprising, with a bow and arrow. The man with the archaic weapons looked at the woman, then at the files, and the woman nodded._

_Natasha's training was the only thing keeping the gun in her hand steady, even as she could feel her muscles quivering with rage, "Now they are here. Hand over the files, Doctor Galdin."_

_Dr. Galdin held them out the agent closest to him and held his hands up in surrender. He watched in horror as her finger pressed against the trigger fractionally._

_Clint stepped over and wrapped his hand around her wrist, as the two agents took the man's arms and tied them securely behind his back. Natasha didn't turn, but her eyes flicked over to Clint, and she slowly lowered her weapon, the tremor beginning to overtake her limbs. She stood still as a statue, as the doctor was led out of the room, collapsing against the wall when he was out of sight._

_She took deep breaths. Clint stood silently nearby for a time._

_When she finally looked over at him, about to speak, he beat her to it, "Man. I would hate to chase you for real. You know you almost clipped me?"_

_She just grinned, "So I missed?"_

_He gave her a hurt expression, "Is this still about that comment about the new uniform?"_

_She pushed off the wall, offered a shrug, and made a move to walk out, but he stopped her with his hand on her arm, "You okay?"_

_Natasha took a breath and turned back to him, a slow smile creeping over her features, "I feel better than I have in a long time."_

"_And your debt?"_

"_Not paid off yet. But this brings me closer to the black for sure."_

A successful interrogation, Black Widow style, required a complicated dance between truth and lies. Sometimes the truth was torture, but that never would have worked here. No, Loki needed to feel that he was tearing her down, so he wouldn't notice when he began to fall.

She smiled, then turned with a sober face, "So Banner – that's your play?"

Rather than spend time gloating, though she would have loved that, she realized the danger of the situation, so she turned and spoke into her comm, "Loki plans to unleash the Hulk. Keep Banner in the lab; I'm on my way. Send Thor as well."

She turned and gave him a tiny bow, "Thank you for your cooperation."

Success.


End file.
